The Transformation of Marxism

The Brussels Journal has a superb review of Paul Edward Gottfried's book entitled: The Strange Death of Marxism. The theme of the book is that Marxism was primarily an economic theory. And, since the establishment of the so called "Frankfurt School" and the change in emphasis from economics to changing the moral and cultural philosophy of Europe. However, as Paul Belien points out:

Contrary to what the title of Gottfried’s book proclaims, I do not think that Marxism is dead in Europe. It has only shifted its emphasis.

The most important parts of the article for me, are the following:

Apart from a long introduction and a conclusion, Gottfried’s book consists of four chapters, dealing with Postwar Communism, Neomarxism, the Post-Marxist Left and the Post-Marxist Left as a political religion. The latter is probably the most interesting for American readers, as it also was to me, an atypical – because pro-American – European. I think it clarifies why the post-Marxist, multicultural social engineering has wreaked such devastating damage in Europe during the past three decades, while America, where Frankfurter School philosophers such as Herbert Marcuse developed their destructive ideas, remained relatively unaffected. Instead of using the state’s power to alter the economic framework of society or promote income redistribution, the Frankfurter School proposed to use the state as a radicalizing cultural force.

He continues:

The Socialist paradigm, which entails the deliberate neglect of any contract or moral principle that does not serve the current political objectives of the State, results in both the expansion of sexual liberty and the disappearance of economic liberty. Economic liberty and prosperity cannot exist unless people are true to their promises and the assumed set of moral rules by which partners are bound within a certain culture. Consequently, Socialism leads to the disappearance of all forms of partnership. Nothing is left but the individual and the State.

The motivation of the cultural vandals of the last 100 years, have always fascinated me. So this book, although written from a perspective of bewailing the death of old Marxism, gives an explanation as to how we have arrived at the current situation. It's very strange for someone like me to wish for the 'good old days' of old fashioned Marxism. But it's vicous decendent cultural Marxism is far, far worse.